A man is accused of letting his girlfriend freeze to death on Austria's highest mountain

The Public Prosecutor's Office of the Austrian city of Innsbruck filed this Thursday charges against a man for having left his girlfriend abandoned with hypothermia and disoriented on Grossglockner, the highest mountain in Austria, where she died frozen.

The tragedy occurred between January 18th and 19th of this year, when the couple, from Salzburg, planned to climb a classic route on Glossglockner, at 3,798 meters high. Unlike her boyfriend, the woman had never before undertaken an alpine excursion of that length, altitude, and difficulty. When the two were already approaching the summit, on January 19th around 02:00, the woman apparently began to collapse and could not continue.

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According to it was reported, the man allegedly went to seek help, but never returned. The prosecution accuses him of taking the woman on that difficult excursion, despite her inexperience, and of not making an emergency call before nightfall. In addition, the authorities reported that after several attempts by police officers to contact the accused, he called them but then silenced his cell phone and did not answer any more calls. By leaving his girlfriend "unprotected, exhausted, hypothermic, and disoriented", the accused didn't even resort to his sleeping bag or the available emergency blankets to protect her from further hypothermia. Likewise, he did not contact the rescue services again and did not inform them of what had happened until 03:30, after descending the usual route to a closed shelter. When help arrived, the woman had already died.

Faced with this, the Prosecution accuses the man of gross negligent homicide. He is charged with several negligences that led to the death of his companion: the woman's inexperience and harsh winter conditions, the start of the trek at too late an hour, the absence of necessary equipment and the decision not to make any emergency calls or give any distress signals when a police helicopter flew over the place at approximately 10:50 p.m., among others.

As part of the investigation, a forensic medical report was obtained, mobile phones, sports watches of the deceased woman and the accused were collected, photographs and videos were evaluated, and witnesses were questioned. For his part, the accused presented a written statement during the investigation procedure, denying any irregularity. The crime of gross negligence manslaughter is punishable by a prison sentence of up to three years.